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Nice stuff!
Recently we made chair legs with ZB Carving. Unfortunately I cannot show the carving. But here is an image of the legs:
The legs are tapered into all sorts of directions, have a sweep, in short... all the evil components of fancy woodworking. To get the mahogany legs into position for our 3/4 Axis router several cradles had to be made. We used Rhino3d to boolean subtract the leg geometry from the stock material we defined and voila... perfect cradles. The legs were routed with tab's. Once they were cut, the legs fit perfectly into the cradles. The cradles were attached to the router bed with clamps. Easy to take out, and back in. After the leg's were carved with the router, all were flap sanded with a fine grit so that the detail does not get damaged to much. Over all 30 mahogany chairs were made with 4 legs each, each engraved on four sides. A month worth of work and a very happy owner in Manhattan. Recently I started to give classes to fellow woodworkers/artisans on how to integrate cnc systems into their workflow. If someone is interested in this, please let me know. We are located 20 minutes away from Manhattan in NJ.

Javalinas rule, if you guys want to talk about getting your zbrush pieces cast check out www.metalphysic.com i know its a shameless plug but we can turn your digital sculpture into a real one. It's not cheap, but its worth it.

Alright you shameless plugger 8).
What are the rough figures you are talking about? How much would a piggy as depicted cost? Cost as in effort. Size like 3 feet long and proportions accordingly. Routed in wood and glued up in a similar process that beasty would be quite expensive. I'd say it would be a week project till it goes out of the door perfectly sanded and finished. How does that measure up to the casting effort?
Cheers
Lemo (taking cover)

5 axis skulls

It's great to get feedback from people in so many different countries. It's also amazing to see behind the scenes of works in progress.

As promised Ziggy here are some screen shots of a project we are doing at the moment.

The first photo is an imported scan of a skull. We used zbrush to clean up some bumps and to smooth over a join line in the top of the replica skull.

The second shot is the skull segmented up in Mayka.
The third is some of the cutting paths Mayka generated to cut the skull.

Total height of the skull with open lower jaw is 42 inches or 1100mm.

The machine is cutting away at the moment, here's a shot of where we are up to.

I'll post the finished piece tomorrow along with cutting times to give you an idea of how long (or short) these sculptures take.
The thing is, this skull is 99.9% accurate to the original cast. That's one of the nice things about having scanning as an option, you can reverse engineer very easily.

WHat's that foam you are using? I did not spend any time researching foam, I use the common insulation foam or if detail is required precision foam which is very expensive and only available as 4'x8'x1" sheet for me. I usually use wood for my sand casting molds. Dense and even woods like Mahogany are working great.
Cheers
Lemo

Foam for sculpting

Hi Lemo,

If the final finish is the polyfoam surface then we use VH ( very hard) grade poly. This can then be hardcoated, which I don't like doing as the hardcoat gun operators can be less than perfect. The type of polyurethane hardcoat material used is also a major factor. Most places use the cheapest brand which can go on very wet and drip all over the sculpture.

If we are to cover the poly with chavant clay or an epoxy paste/putty we use a standard display grade (M).

There are 2 grades in between the VH and the M grades.

The VH grade can be sanded and not produce a furry finish. It's about 3 times as expensive as the M grade. It is also 3 times as dense as the M grade foam.

As you know the final surface of the foam will dictate what types of moulding materials can be used against it, and this is an issue in itself.